by Liska Jacobs
“Would you like to see it?” Rafa asks. He’s very smooth; the cadence of his voice matches his eyes, almond-shaped, with long lashes and meticulously groomed eyebrows. If it weren’t for that square jaw and faint beard he’d look like a schoolboy.
“Actually,” I say, glancing quickly at Tom, “I’ve got to go.”
He kisses me then, quick and right on the mouth. He motions to Tom and, laughing a little, says, “That your novio?”
“If he is, then kissing me wasn’t a very nice thing to do.”
He shrugs, a practiced gesture of humble conceit, letting me go in favor of his beer. His friends have lost interest too; they’ve turned back to the television.
Rafa catches me glancing at the bathroom. His face lights up.
“Ah,” he says. “Novio’s taking a piss.”
I manage a carefree sound, something between a giggle and a sigh.
“I’m here with friends. The one in the bathroom is my ex-husband.”
He wrinkles his nose at me, entertained, and tips the last of his beer into his mouth. It’s funny, I’d started to forget what he looked like. No, that’s not right; I didn’t forget. It started to change, or morph, or whatever it is that time does to a moment after it’s happened. I remembered his hands—large and skilled. How they felt rough on my hips, but in the water they were soft. Yet here they are, ordinary male hands with bony knuckles and too-large thumbs scooping chips and salsa into a mouth I remembered being tender. I had forgotten his dimples, too—how they add to the schoolboy effect. He is both handsome and pretty. I remembered the curls and his height and the wicked shape of his chin, like a stonecutting blade, but I misplaced the sound of his voice, how it’s flat and practiced and when he speaks he looks right through you.
This startles me. How quick and easy it is to forget. How imagination can step in, fill those holes without you knowing.
I try to pull up Eric in Provincetown. His bottom lip sucked in, his eyes narrowed, almost steely. What am I forgetting? What am I changing? Did he have freckles? No. Just a mole near his temple. And his cheeks always pink. Bare arms, a tan stopping where his sleeves are cuffed. Delicate wrists, but wait, that’s him holding a pen in his office, not standing on the beach with anger weighing him down, hands clenched into fists.
Tom lights a cigarette and leans back in his chair, legs casually crossed. When our eyes meet, one side of his mouth tilts up and he blows smoke toward Marisol, who playfully pushes it away.
“So what do you say? Dinner?” Rafa smiles, bats those heavy dark lashes.
Whatever show his friends are watching has gotten them into a heated debate. One says, “Let’s settle it, then,” and slams his fist onto the table. The one in the tank top looks at Rafa and me.
“Doug thinks I won’t beat him at arm wrestling,” his friend says.
“It’s an ongoing argument,” Rafa apologizes. “Please don’t banish me to dinner with them.”
Tom’s alone now. I look around but don’t see Rachel or Marisol. He points his cigarette at me, and like in some slow-motion scene from a telenovela, he gets up and crosses the patio, grinding the cigarette into a flower box.
I let out a strangled half laugh that surprises even me. “You win. But I can’t come with you now.”
Rafa strokes my bare arm with his thumb, his face soft. “Whatever works for you, Mama. What are you in the mood to eat?”
“Anything, just as long as the wine’s good.”
He rubs his lip with his thumb, the tip of his tongue darting out to meet it. Tom is there now, extending his hand to Rafa.
“Tom,” he says with an impish smile.
“Hey, buddy.” Rafa takes his hand. “Rafael.”
“And how do you know our darling girl here?” Tom asks, putting an arm around me.
“Oh, we go way back,” I say. “Old friends. We’re going to catch up over dinner tonight. Isn’t that right?”
Rafa taps his lip again. “Whatever you say, Mama.”
I ignore the pleasure Tom is taking in this. He looks over at the bathrooms, waiting for Robby and Jared to emerge. Robby will see right through this, and he’ll ask hard questions. He’ll want to know the truth—that I arrived a few days early, that I met this man on a private beach and didn’t care enough to give my real name or remember his, that I may or may not have invited him to this island—that I’m jobless and scared and taking various pills stolen from my mother.
“Should I check on them?” Tom says with mock concern, gesturing toward the bathrooms.
I ignore him, telling Rafa I’m free at eight.
The bathroom doors swing open then, and there is Robby, looking directly at us, followed by Jared, pink-faced and swaying.
“Oh, look.” Tom smiles. “Here they come.” He even waves.
Rafa seems just as entertained as Tom now. “Eight o’clock, Bistro de la Mer? It’s the only decent restaurant in this amusement park.”
“Sure. Perfect.”
Rafa’s pleased with himself, and sits back on his barstool just as Robby arrives.
“I sent Jared to the golf cart. Everything all right?” His shoulders are tight, thrown back a little. He’s looking from Tom to Rafa. I can tell he thinks I need saving.
“Just making dinner plans with an old friend, apparently,” Tom says, smiling at me.
Rafa looks Robby up and down, fingers his beer bottle. “See you tonight,” he says to me, making a show of kissing my cheek.
“You know that guy?” Robby says when we make our way back to the golf cart. His voice is hesitant, tense.
Jared is in the backseat of the golf cart, half asleep. “Took long enough, jeez,” he says. “I got churros for Charly; they’ll be cold now.”
We climb in on either side, with Tom at the wheel. Robby mumbles, “Nice fucking diamond earring. He a cocaine tycoon or something?”
I make my voice as steady and light as possible, which is easy now because the crisis is over. “Produces TV shows, makes a killing.”
This I know will shut Robby up. Talking about money always does. He grows quiet and withdrawn.
Jared stirs. “Wait, what’d I miss?”
“Oh,” Tom says cheerfully, “there was almost a second Alamo.”
“Please shut up,” I say. “Let’s get to the market without running into anyone else.”
“Any old friends, you mean.” Tom gives me a look that says we’re in cahoots now.
Jared rests his chin on my shoulder from the backseat. “Don’t tell Charly about Rachel, ’kay?” The golf cart jerks forward, thrusting him back into his seat.
23
“Ohh, they have steamed mussels!” Charly says from the bedroom. She’s looking at Bistro de la Mer on her tablet, her skin dewy from her facial. “Look at these prices. Who is this guy?”
“He produces television shows,” I tell her from the bathroom.
“Really? Which show?”
My reflection is looking a little worn-out. Even after a second shower and a face scrub and a mask I still look weathered.
“I don’t know, he might not have said.”
Charly’s glistening face pops into the bathroom. “How well do you know this guy? I mean, what if he stalked you here, have you thought of that?”
I’m using powder, and a great plume of beige has settled over the sink. I can’t say that I don’t remember whether I told Rafa to meet me here or not. It would mean I’d have to explain that the last time I saw him I was very high and very drunk—or, for that matter, the last time I saw him was the first time I met him, and that would be giving away too much.
“This is the modern dating world, darling. There’s always some risk involved.”
“Ohh, is this a date?” She bats her lashes. “Are you dating him?”
I plop some powder on her nose. “It’s just dinner.”
Up on the deck Robby and Jared have started the grill; the smell of oak and lighter fluid comes through the open window. Since our return from town Tom ha
s been on a roll, making every effort to imply that he and I share some big secret, winking at me over Robby’s head when he asks about my dinner plans, telling me I should wear something nice for my old friend. When we carried the groceries into the house from the golf cart he lingered beside me, whispering Heartbreaker in my ear.
“I wish you weren’t going,” Charly says, sitting on the edge of the bathtub. “But this is nice. It’s like when we used to get ready before a junior high dance. Remember? It seems forever ago. I miss those days. We were so innocent. Do you remember my pink denim skirt? It had silver rhinestones on the pockets.”
I’m working eyeliner onto my eyelid. I smile at her in the mirror.
“You’ll have fun tonight, Robby says it’s a good lineup at the Casino.”
“I loved that skirt; it was my sister’s.” She watches me for a moment. “Who taught you to put makeup on like that?”
I examine the eyeliner. “A cousin, maybe. Or a friend in high school, I don’t remember.”
Charly lets her shoulders drop. She leans over and turns the water on in the tub.
“I learned all my makeup tips from you. Did you know that?” She turns the water off and watches the tub drain.
“God, I hope that isn’t true.” I laugh. “You know, I probably learned from the women at my mother’s salon in Bakersfield.”
“Jared likes it,” she says, sighing a little. “And Robby. And Tom. I think I’ll take a bath before dinner.”
I turn to look at her. She was always a self-conscious girl, the kind you want to make sure gets home okay. I suddenly remember a story she told me once. Charly is sixteen when her older sister, the one with the tendency to swim naked in their pool while Charly and her boyfriend study, calls from some Florida college to invite her for spring break in the Keys. So Charly kisses her boyfriend goodbye—a real good make-out session, because Charly’s a very capable virgin—and heads to Florida. Her sister takes her to one of the islands and shows Charly how to snorkel. They hold hands and swim out past the seaweed, through the dark shadows, when sea snakes, hundreds of them, emerge from a boulder, their bodies moving with such grace that it’s beautiful and terrifying all at once.
That image stays with me—the water warm and salty, soothing. How relaxed and free you’d feel. And then snakes, but your sister is there, taking your arm, looking at you from behind goggles—her eyes magnified. I can picture it perfectly: Trust me, she is saying. I’ve got you. It makes sense suddenly, why Charly is the way she is with me. Why she hasn’t written me off. Sisterhood is something I don’t understand, something I’ve always thought could bite back—like those sea snakes, beautiful, dangerous, a little mysterious. Best to get out of the water altogether.
But poor Charly, despite how the story ends, still has not learned that lesson. Her sister was a flirtatious drunk who thought it hilarious to finally admit to sleeping with Charly’s boyfriend. The way she laughed, Elsa, Charly told me. She laughed like we’d both think it was funny.
“Do you want me to stay?” I ask Charly.
She’s filling the tub, running her hand under the water. She shakes her head.
“Just make sure it doesn’t take you five years to come back,” she says with a little tilt of her head. That dizzy look is back. She looks pill drunk. I want to ask how many she’s taken, but there’s a knock at the door.
Robby sticks his head in. “Burger or dog?” he asks Charly.
“Hot diggity dog!” She giggles. “And have Jared toast the bun, too.”
Robby looks at me. I can see his throat working. “You look nice,” he manages.
24
I’m already loose from the Vicodin I took, and everything starts blurring together. Soft focus. Watching Charly shove hot dogs with mustard and relish into her face while Jared knocks back whiskey like it’s the cheap stuff. Jane asking for a veggie burger without onions and taking it personally when Robby says, I thought you liked onions? Tom laughing, always. Robby growing fierce and defensive.
Robby’s thinking of me, of course. I’m the one who likes onions, but I don’t say anything. I let them go over it—and over and over—working it out as if onions were some vital detail.
Then Tom is there, taking me out to the deck. The light is blistery and golden, the cruise ship floats on the horizon like a large buoyant pearl. He makes as if to hand me my purse but then shakes it to hear the prescription bottle. My little tambourine. I snatch it from him, relieved he didn’t go through it; the last of the Miramar coke is in the inside pocket.
He lights a joint and passes it to me. “Want to hear a story?” he asks, pushing my hair behind one of my ears.
“What about?” I blow smoke at him.
He licks his lips, making them glisten, and sits on one of the deck chairs. “The sexiest thing I’ve ever seen,” he says, rubbing the seat next to him, so I sit too.
I take another drag from the joint and turn so I don’t have to see the excitement in his eyes.
“I was visiting a cousin.” His voice floats over to me. “In East Los Angeles. It was a real shithole neighborhood, lots of stucco and duplexes, small yappy dogs everywhere. You know the kind.”
I nod my head yes.
“It was around Christmas. A single mom lived next door. She was in her early forties, possibly younger but life had hit her hard—you could tell. Her kid was young, cried all the damn time, a real brat. One night I hear fighting—her boyfriend was this big Salvadoran dude, tatted all over, wore a bandana. They were really going at each other, just screaming their heads off. I don’t know where the kid was. They had gotten a Christmas tree earlier that day and I had watched the boyfriend sweating and swearing, trying to lug it into the duplex. Anyway, I hear a slap—a real good smack—and then the screen door bangs and the boyfriend’s car peels out down the street. It’s late, maybe one or two in the morning. So I go out, and I see her inside, the mom. She’s in jeans, the top button undone, with no shirt on. She’s wearing this flimsy bra. I can see her nipples through it. And she’s crying, hanging Christmas ornaments on the tree by herself.”
That’s terrible, I say—but really I’m not sure I’ve said anything at all. My voice seems very far away, and I’ve missed something. We’re no longer sitting, but standing very close together, near the end of the deck. And the view has changed. The light is nearly gone, almost dark. But I’m still partially in East Los Angeles, stuck with the smell of Christmas tree and scorched rubber.
“That’s just how it is, baby,” comes Tom’s voice. “The worst kind of want is to survive, and we all have that.”
“The joint is almost finished,” I try to say.
“Come here,” Tom says. His hands at my waist feel sudden but then I think maybe they’ve been there the whole time. His voice in my ear: Take it easy, girl, he breathes. This weed’s got bite.
I make an effort to push him away but he asks if I’ll blow the last of the smoke into his mouth. It’s just us, out on the deck watching the darkening palms, the smoke curling up like a question mark between us, then blowing out toward the sea. I can feel the strength of his hands, his thumbs digging in. Brute. I’m imagining that hard slap, the sting of hand against cheek and a metallic taste of blood.
And then I’m pushing away, saying goodbye, relieved to get away for a bit. From Tom’s jeering, Robby’s uneasiness, that motion Jane does with her arms as she explains the various parts of a mango papaya facial. Charly walks me as far as the door, asks if I will meet them at the Casino. You can bring Rafa, I’m sure we’d love to meet him. Just try, okay?
And then thank God I’m down at the beach watching the older children ride bikes. Tom was right, the weed is strong—probably too strong. I try not to struggle against it. The sun has tipped behind the mountains and the jazz band on the lawn has picked up, the trumpet hopscotching with the drum kit, the piano following close behind. I tell my heartbeat to calm down.
A group of well-dressed black couples—all slacks and knee-length dresses and
skirts—dance on the lawn. Someone has a bubble machine and the toddlers trip after the lopsided pearly spheres. I watch one float up toward the trees, the children jumping and stretching after it. I blow at it. Get away, little bubble.
Up ahead there’s been a bike accident, two rentals have collided. Both parties are fine but traffic’s stopped. The music from the lawn has stopped too—or at least I can’t hear it over the noise. A line of golf carts stretches in both directions, their little horns going meep-meep while two men in cargo shorts and strappy sandals wave their bike helmets at each other. At the docks the cruisers are waiting for tugboats to take them back to steak dinners and ballroom drinks, the tugboat horns ringing off the mountains like thunder rolling in—boom-boom. A group of boys in basketball jerseys spray silly string at one another, the girls walking in front of them, smiling back over their shoulders. My skin feels too tight—I can suddenly feel the bones underneath. One of the boys turns. Is he looking at me? I jump when someone whistles, sharp and grating.
Rafa is waiting outside the restaurant. He’s smoking a thin cigar, the smoke putt-putting out of his mouth. He smiles, such confidence, that diamond earring twinkling.
“Susanna,” he says. He drops the cigar into a potted tree and kisses me on the corner of my mouth. I can taste his aftershave.
“Stunning.” He sounds practiced, his voice strangely entrancing. Like being in the desert on a hot day with cicadas in the trees, their high-pitched buzzing a vibration through your skin.
“You stun me,” he’s saying. A shiver crawls up over me.
He holds open the restaurant door to a crowded small room made to look like a yacht club. Tan wood everywhere, knotted ropes, and a rusty anchor next to a fish tank. The bar has a mirrored back, so I can see Rafa and me enter. In this light, my hair is blazing red.
The maître d’ must like what he sees too because he gets very eager and jolly. He seats us at a window table, telling Rafa he’s glad to have him back. But the way the maître d’s stomach brushes against everything—the chair he pulls out for me, the menu he takes from his side, my arm when he bends over to point out the specials—makes me jumpy. Reminds me of lunch at the Plaza, that waiter with the sagging cheeks—Mary in the bathroom, only a matter of minutes before she comes back.